8:50 AM, February 24, 2011 ι Abby Wisse Schachter
In Foreign Affairs this month, Walter Russell Mead has some bad news for President Obama . Mead argues that the Tea Party is here to stay in one form or another and that it is important for US foeign policy to reflect that fact. Mead says, however, that a proper understanding of how "Jacksonian" populists - aka teapartiers -- see the world is key:
"There is much in the Tea Party movement to give foreign policy thinkers pause, but effective foreign policy must always begin with a realistic assessment of the facts on the ground. Today's Jacksonians are unlikely to disappear. Americans should rejoice that in many ways the Tea Party movement, warts and all, is a significantly more capable and reliable partner for the United States' world-order-building tasks than were the isolationists of 60 years ago. Compared to the Jacksonians during the Truman administration, today's are less racist, less antifeminist, less homophobic, and more open to an appreciation of other cultures and worldviews. Their starting point, that national security requires international engagement, is considerably more auspicious than the knee-jerk isolationism that Truman and Acheson faced. Even in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, there was no public support for the equivalent of the internment of Japanese Americans after Pearl Harbor, nor has there been anything like the anticommunist hysteria of the McCarthy era. Today's southern Republican populists are far more sympathetic to core liberal capitalist concepts than were the populist supporters of William Jennings Bryan a century ago."
One aspect of the tea party movement that really ought to give Obama pause is its overarching support for Israel. As Mead explains: "Jacksonian support for Israel will also be a factor. Sympathetic to Israel and concerned about both energy security and terrorism, Jacksonians are likely to accept and even demand continued U.S. diplomatic, political, and military engagement in the Middle East. Not all American Jacksonians back Israel, but in general, rising Jacksonian political influence in the United States will lead to stronger support in Washington for the Jewish state. This support does not proceed simply from evangelical Christian influence. Many Jacksonians are not particularly religious, and many of the pro-Jacksonian "Reagan Democrats" are Roman Catholics. But Jacksonians admire Israeli courage and self-reliance -- and they do not believe that Arab governments are trustworthy or reliable allies. They are generally untroubled by Israeli responses to terrorist attacks, which many observers deem "disproportionate." Jacksonian common sense does not give much weight to the concept of disproportionate force, believing that if you are attacked, you have the right and even the duty to respond with overwhelming force until the enemy surrenders. That may or may not be a viable strategy in the modern Middle East, but Jacksonians generally accept Israel's right to defend itself in whatever way it chooses. They are more likely to criticize Israel for failing to act firmly in Gaza and southern Lebanon than to criticize it for overreacting to terrorist attacks."
Simply put, this is just not the way Obama has conducted policy toward Israel. Moreover, the president and his administration doesn't seem prepared to do anything in support of Israel without grousing and complaining about it. Witness the recent veto of a Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements. Obama was even on the wrong side of this from his own party's perspective as many Congressional Democrats pleaded with the White House to support Israel. These staunch Israel supporters could not have been pleased with the administration's follow-up complaints and castigation of Israel.
Botoom line: Obama's foreign policy is looking more and more like a negative as he tries to woo back independents and centrists who repudiated his agenda in November 2010.
